Secrets Revealed
by SpoOkYjAgfaN
Summary: I ran with the enzyme Abby found in the blood sample Ducky had her test. Here's my take on what happened.
1. Introduction

This story begins during the episode: "Dog Tags" Gibbs has just exited the elevator from Visiting with Abby. As he steps out, he sees Ducky approach Jenny at the base of the stairs ascending to MTAC.

* * *

"If you have a moment, I'd like to go up to your office and discuss this with you."

Gibbs watched as Ducky and Director Shepard walked up the stairs to her office, clipboard in hand. He wished he knew what was on that clipboard. He needed to know. He needed to be on top of the health of all of his agents, above and below him. But this was different. It was personal. It was Jen.

Up in the Director's office, Jen knew what Ducky was going to tell her. She didn't need to listen. She couldn't take her mind off the way Gibbs had stared at her. He was staring into her soul. He knew. He had to know. Why else would he look at her like that? "No!" She thought. He couldn't be sure of it. There must still be doubt in his mind. And he was not going to get confirmation. She had to keep this from him; from everyone.

"As you can see, Director Shepard, these tests to not prove much. In order to avoid suspicion from Abigail, I did not have her run the series of tests which will narrow down exactly what is causing your blood to show high levels of Creatine Kinase. I'm afraid, because symptoms could take at best, several years to appear, the only way to determine exactly what is conspiring inside of you, is to bring Abigail in on what is going on."

Ducky paused to study the look on her face. He couldn't tell exactly what she was thinking; only that she was hiding something. It wasn't going to take years for her symptoms to appear, he was an optimist. She knew something wasn't right, why else had she come to him? Choosing his words carefully, he began again, "Director, why exactly did you have me run these tests?"

Jenny could say nothing. It was obvious he was trying to reassure her, by giving her the best case scenario. But deep down, she knew, there was no best case scenario. This disease inside of her had been poking its face around for some time now. She wasn't even sure how long she had been ignoring the signs.

Her silence was Ducky's answer. "How long Director?"

She sucked in her bottom lip, and shook her head. "I don't even know." She couldn't bring herself to make eye contact with the concerned Doctor.

Ducky sat back in the chair he was seated in, and exhaled long, and slow. Then he unpursed his lips, and looked back at the Director. "I need for you to tell me _everything_."


	2. Putting the Pieces Together

Downstairs in the bullpen, Petty Officer Erica Perelli was breaking the news about the dog Abby had fallen in love with to McGee and Gibbs.

"I wish it could be another way, but it's Navy Policy in fatal dog mauling cases."

Gibbs didn't say a word, he just stared at McGee, who wasn't exactly sure what to do or say at first.

"Uh, Boss, I can take Petty Officer Perelli down if you'd like" He wasn't very confident in what he'd just said, but he'd said it. The look on Gibbs face was burning a hole through him. If only McGee knew Gibbs was only half paying attention to the situation, and it wouldn't have taken much to satisfy him.

At McGee's offer, Gibbs walked off. For once, he truly wasn't paying much attention to what was going on in his case. Vaguely hearing McGee step up and take control, and he took the exit quickly, before his agent realized he wasn't all there. His mind did somehow made its way to Abby, and how devastated she would be when the dog left, and she would probably take it out on the team for a week or two. But he only rested on that thought for a second. Like a magnet, the situation upstairs was back on his mind. What he wouldn't give to be a fly on that wall right now. Somehow he was going to find out on his own. He wasn't going to force it out of either one of them. There was one current investigation that was going to get his full attention.

Meanwhile, back upstairs, Director Shepard was explaining to Ducky how she knew the disease that was progressing inside of her, and the ways it had already begun to show its face.

"According to his records, he first saw a doctor about the disease just a few years before he died." Jen picked up a thick file from atop her desk, and passed it to Ducky. The edge of the folder read "**Shepard, Jasper**" The room fell silent for what seemed hours as he read the sloppy scribbling of notes from cover to cover.

His thoughts wandered over the symptoms listed in the charts, and the lack of tests run. It puzzled him why a more specific form of the disease had never been determined. A simple biopsy of the muscle would narrow it down.

"Director, I'd like to perform a muscle biopsy. There is no reason to bring anyone else in if you'd prefer. I believe it would satisfy both our curiosities"

He shifted his attention from the file to the woman staring out the window. There was still one more question lingering on his mind. As a doctor, he knew the disease was congenital, but he wondered how she had put the pieces together. Her father had died 12 years prior, and the severity of his symptoms was not yet to a point anyone would truly notice.

"Director, how did you know to look in your father's medical records?"

Slowly Jen swiveled her chair around to face Ducky. At first she couldn't bring herself to speak. Showing someone else her father's medical records meant she was accepting her fate. She was scared. That was not something she could easily admit to herself; to anyone.

"One time Ducky; I saw it _one_ time. And my father's reaction to what happened is the reason it stuck out in my brain." She paused remembering a night she was at home with her father.

_It was late, too late for a 10 year old to be out of bed. Colonel Shepard thought his daughter had fallen asleep hours before. He didn't know the ferocious storm brewing outside had woken her. She didn't like thunder storms, but she would never dare admit to her father that she was afraid. _

"_Face your fears" He would say. "You must look at it head on, and be strong. Fight, don't back down, and don't let it win. Marines have no fears." _

_But she didn't want to face her fears. They stayed locked up in the back of her mind, threatening to overtake her on nights like tonight. She wanted to run down to him and nestle in his lap. She wanted him hold her and rock her and to tell her it would be alright, like her mother would do. She knew better though. Instead, she would sit on the stairs; as close to him as she dared get. He was within her eyesight, but she remained unseen. _

_She watched as he poured himself a glass of bourbon. Her mother hated the stuff, and warned her against it, but she longed to try it; to be just like her father. It might take her fears away. One day she would have to find out. _

_She watched as he lifted the glass. It got about halfway to his mouth when suddenly it hit the floor. He hated messes. She knew he would be mad at himself. But he didn't proceed to clean it up, and that was odd. Instead, he cursed, and shook his hand violently up and down. She didn't understand why. She didn't understand why she had seen Sophia, their housekeeper, cleaning up the spilled liquid the following morning._

She didn't understand until now.

"At first, I paid no attention to the symptoms; my fingers slipping on the keyboard, or losing my grip on a pen." She paused and glanced at the mug of coffee on her desk. "I broke a glass Ducky"


End file.
